Over a 120 health-related NGOs from across the globe have launched a declaration calling for a Currency Transaction Levy (CTL) for Health. Their message for decision-makers is simple: say ‘¥€$ to H£ALTH’.
Coalition members are committed to ensuring we meet the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) for health, namely: reducing child mortality; improving maternal health; and combating the killer diseases, HIV/AIDS, TB and malaria, by 2015 (MDGs 4, 5 & 6).
Yet it is widely acknowledged that current levels of development assistance are insufficient to meet these vital health targets - a problem compounded by the global financial crisis. New and additional income streams are urgently needed.
A growing coalition of health NGOs have united to call for a CTL on the world’s most traded currencies, the pound, the dollar, the euro and the yen. This would generate more than US$30billion of extra revenue a year.
The health MDGs are already perilously off track. For example, maternal mortality rates have decreased by less than 1% per year from 1990 to 2005, and in 2009 a woman still dies in childbirth almost every minute.
A child born in a developing country is over 13 times more likely to die within their first five years than a child born in an industrial country.
Gender also continues to fuel inequalities within health, for example, in sub-Saharan Africa almost 75% of HIV infections in 15–24 year-olds are among young women.
The global financial crisis threatens to undermine the health MDGs still further, by reducing much needed aid flows. As calls come from all quarters for a more equitable global financial system, the time is right to harness the massive wealth of the foreign exchange markets into the service of saving lives.
Please see the Currency Transaction Levy for Health declaration with a full list of signatories below.
Also see the ¥€$ to H£ALTH briefing – an 8 page document that outlines in detail the funding shortfall and how the CTL could help fill this gap.
|
|
|
| Download File: |  |
CTL for Health Declaration
Download this file: CTL_for_Health_Declaration.pdf
File Format: PDF
Author: CTL for Health
Date added: 23 September 2009
CTL for Health Briefing
Download this file: CTL_for_Health_Briefing.pdf
File Format: PDF
Author: CTL for Health
Date added: 23 September 2009
|
|
